


Brave New World

by mikhala_c



Category: Alien Series, Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, Body Horror, Canon-Typical Violence, Crack Treated Seriously, Eventual Romance, F/M, M/M, Mad Science, Major Character Injury, Major Character Undeath, Minor Character Death, Multi, Self-Indulgent, Ship everyone with adventure and self discovery, Space Marines, Xenomorphs (Alien)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-02
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-03-26 00:08:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13845921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mikhala_c/pseuds/mikhala_c
Summary: There are moments in every life when a person has to take stock of their situation and the choices that led them to where they are. Sgt. Jo Harvelle just doesn’t have time for that but, if she did, she might have thought back to the choice of going against her mother’s wishes and chosen something other than being a space marine like her father.Things are not all they seem on Project Eden. Both Human and Synthetic life must struggle to survive in the face of an alien menace and internal threats as apart of an elaborate test run by a Megacorporation.





	1. Sgt. Harvelle

**Author's Note:**

> This is an episodic story told from different points of view with a bit of a mystery meant to be pieced together a bit at a time.Unreliable narrators ahead.

There are moments in every life when a person has to take stock of their situation and the choices that led them to where they are. Sgt. Jo Harvelle just doesn’t have time for that but, if she did, she might have thought back to the choice of going against her mother’s wishes and chosen something other than being a space marine like her father.

She would have chosen anything else just to not be stuck in this dead end hallway face to whatever with this deadly motherfucker.

If she could have done things differently she would have never taken that commission out to Cygnus 6 to run security on the moon of some nameless little planet being terraformed by Edlund Industries. They called the little rock Carthage and that should have been her first clue. Marines were a superstitious lot for a reason bad names invited bad things; you never heard about the massacre at Fluffy Bunny Station 2 did you?

If she hadn’t taken that commission she wouldn’t have been under Capt. Walker and she wouldn’t have been apart of a security mop up gone bad. Like a vid flickering in fast forward she can see the way the mission went as it runs through her head while the thing in front of her curls back its inky black lips to flash razor sharp silver fangs……

If.

If.

But this is what happened:　

They’d gotten the basic rundown of the situation; Edlund was setting up this planet and its double moons as the new Utopia. The company was in the pre-stages of colonization and were taking the opportunity to run some tests on the native species and the environment. 

It all sounded so PC and standard that the whole unit was already commenting on the bullshit level even before they landed.

When they touched down they were greeted by a hologram of the lead research scientist Dr. Shirley. Jo could barely hear over the other men’s jokes and snickering to catch what the good doctor was saying. She caught the gist of it though. Carthage, or Eden as the Doc wanted it called, was in the final stages of the project. This meant that the human population was just recently increased but the majority of the workload was still being shouldered by synthetic humans.

It was a testament to the good doctor’s vanity that he called the Synths ‘Angels’.

That was how they got introduced to Lucifer, a first generation android and the main facilitator of the colony wide infrastructure. It wasn’t hard to tell that the bad blood between the humans and the Synths was rearing its ugly head already; Capt. Walker wouldn’t even look at the thing when he spoke to it. Not that the act seemed to phase Lucifer. The Synth kept his pleasantly neutral expression as he explained the core problem that required the marines; a prison transport ship had experienced a systems malfunction outside Carthage’s orbit and there had been a mass exodus from the crippled vessel. Normally there wouldn’t have been a problem but one of the escape pods had hit the Habitation unit that housed the local security force.

The Halo, yes she can remember rolling her eyes at that one, had lost power and communication with that unit’s command Synth, Michael, had been severed. After that the trouble really started. Near as they could figure the inmates must have escaped and were running wild colony side. Buildings were getting tore to pieces, Synths were failing to check in, and, worst of all, humans were dying. The company had sent for the Marines to come in and round up these assholes and make it snappy. Lethal force was allowed.

It sounded like a peach job; kill the baddies, get the pay, and earn your time off for psych R&R. All they had to do was find the prisoners.

Oh, they found them alright. 

They found something else out there too.

It wasn’t until they got one in the spotlight that they had the first inclining of what they were up against. They’d lost two marines already out of their squad of twelve. Jo still can’t fathom why they clung to the belief it was a bunch of barely armed prisoners offing the men for as long as they did. They should have known after they found what was left of the first body but the Captain was just so sure they were dealing with a bunch of sick freaks.

The only prisoner they found was a skinny little thing by the name of Becky Rosen. She’d been a Yeoman who filed the wrong paperwork at the wrong time and heard things she shouldn’t and decided to blab according to her file. Walker was shaking the crap out of her trying to get some answers when she went bone white and started screaming.

Fuller got it in the spotlight and it took a minute before anyone could react to what they were seeing. It was curled on the wall of the little supply depot, all long limbs and shiny black skin, looking all the world like a lounging cat. Jo can remember thinking that it was odd to be scared of something that didn’t have eyes, she was always afraid of spiders herself, and she wondered how it could move with that long dome of a head.

They all found out it moved pretty damn well.

In the time it took for them to sort their thoughts the thing had crossed a forty foot distance in a single leap and tore into that poor bastard Fuller. Once the light went out it was chaos. Guns were firing and the men where shouting. Jo can remember Walker’s order to fall back and she can still taste the bile in the back of her throat as they climbed back into the transport when there were still men inside the depot.

She has no idea what she could have done even if she wasn’t as terrified as she had been but she knows she could have done something.

Anything.

Instead she stares across the transport at little Becky Rosen who sits huddled in on herself praying.

When they get back to the main Halo they find out shit has gone from bad to worse. The things are everywhere and to add insult to injury they find out the creatures didn’t come from the transport. No, those poor bastards picked them up getting their ship repaired planetside, Edlund Industries was growing their own. Jo read the report over Walker’s shoulder, she couldn’t keep up with the techno babble but she got enough to know that these things were the important research the colony was here to do. Like millions of eggheads before them Dr. Shirley and his cohorts were trying to make a better monster, a tamer one, and the original apparently wanted its copyright maintained. She got a good enough look at the files to know they were dealing with a hive sort of beasty and that was all she needed to know.

Apparently she and Walker were on the same wavelength because he declared it time to get the hell out of dodge.

Then good old Lu had to burst their bubble; the things had followed them home. They had followed the food and now the bastards were between them and the shuttle. Walker wanted to get the scientists together and armed, maybe, just maybe, we might blow enough of a hole to get to the shuttle and get away.

Lucifer had almost looked…sad…when he informed them that the colonist had already left. They had run as soon as the marines had gone out into the wild to make a lovely distraction. Lucifer’s account left the population of the Halo down to six Synths counting himself and the twelve infants in the nursery, clones, left behind in favor of the real people.

It hadn’t been a surprise what happened next. 

It had been the logical course.

It had felt wrong.

If the creatures wanted food then they’d get a buffet. Walker had them roll the clones into one of the locked docking bays. The plan was to open the doors and let the things chow down while they hightailed it to the shuttle.The thing was Becky refused to go. The ditzy little bitch took one look at Walker and told him where he could shove his shuttle. Jo couldn’t understand why really, they were just clones, and the few other marines just didn’t care. Hayes muttered something under his breath and handed a sidearm to the woman before he left for the hall.

When the security door slide shut Jo noticed that the Synths were inside too, no one had given them any weapons, but it was in their programming. They’d always risk their necks for a human in danger, even one of the old first gens like Lu. Jo was focusing on her task when Walker slapped open the bay door, she was trying to not hear the sounds those things made when they caught the scent, she pushed away the sound of the clones crying, and set her teeth against the echo of the shots.

She had two shots left in her rifle, a grenade, and her father’s old service revolver. What could she do?

Something.

Anything.

As the rest of the squad made their mad dash toward the shuttle she turned back and kicked the panel for the security door. It slid open to a scene of carnage and she worried that she was too late. Synths were torn open and spread everywhere, the milky white connective fluid painting the walls along with the red of human blood and too little of that vicious yellow acid of the things. The black shapes where huddled over their meals when Jo heard the baby cry. Over to her right half hidden by the large expanse of black crawling toward it.

She could see the edges of Lucifer’s uniform as he pressed the huddled shape of Becky against the wall behind him, both of them shielding one last plastic cradle and its occupant. She didn’t think she just fired. One shot for the one crawling toward them and the other for the one looking to pounce on her. She’d nailed them both right through the dome. She’d never been so good of a shot and she thanked God for the small miracles as she hauled back and pitched the now useless rifle at the teeming mass in the middle of the room. It clattered off the patent leather like hides and she followed it up with a shout to do the Corps proud. “Hey! You ugly sons of bitches! Come try some pure Earther!”

She watched as the group stopped feeding and lifted up to look toward her.

She watched as one of them rose up, and up, and up.

Jo knew these things came in big and ah, crap. She was not aware that holy shit! was also an option. Her boots squealed as she turned tail and ran back down the hall toward the center of the Halo. She could hear them. She could hear the scrabble of their claws and the chilling joyous sound they made as they chased after her. She was glad they couldn’t understand what it meant when the metal on metal sound of the pin being pulled echoed back to them as she dropped the grenade.

She couldn’t risk throwing it. Couldn’t risk mistiming it and not catching enough in the blast.

Enough to give them time to get away.

The explosion knocked her off her feet and sent her skidding down the hall on her side. She couldn’t hear anything other than the ringing in her ears and she could feel the slow trickle of blood down the sides of her face as she heaved herself back onto her feet. She had to keep moving.

If there were any left they would be pissed.

Limping, bleeding and stumbling, she rounded a corner and found herself facing a wall. In a rage she slammed her fist against it before turning around and then she found herself face to dome with the big one…..

Jo felt her heart clench in her chest as she slid her hand ever so slowly to the holster at her hip. The mouth opened just as slowly in a hiss and she could see another smaller set of teeth lurking within. She didn’t have the time to pull the gun, she’d never clear leather before the thing punched a hole in her face just like one of them had done to Murphy, but she couldn’t let it end like this without doing something.

The safety clicked ominously but the creature didn’t react to the noise. Jo twisted the holster, the action digging her belt into her stomach hard enough to draw blood, and pointed the barrel up toward the toothy visage of death. “Eat me you ugly mother-”

Bang!

The world went yellow and started to burn.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jo wakes up.

Boy is she surprised about that turn of events. She can’t manage to be too happy over that simply because she can’t get over the fact that she can’t see anything. She strains to hear the telltale sounds of the things as she searches feebly for her gun. As she pats down her front she realizes that she’s not wearing her uniform anymore.

From the texture she’d guess it’s a hospital gown of some sort.

That in mind she starts to sit up slowly, feeling the sticky give of the tape at her elbow and the pressure of several IVs in her skin. She barely manages to bite back the shriek when a hand touches her shoulder. She still flinches and wonders at the lack of noise, soothing or shushing like most people would do. “Don’t sit up so quickly. You will do yourself more damage.”

“Lucifer?”

“Yes.” A human would have had inflection. Lucifer’s tone is just the same pleasantly bland as it had been in the docking bay when they first arrived.

“How? What happened? “ She holds herself back from the half dozen other questions that lingered on the tip of her tongue and settles for the one she deems most important. “Are we….are we safe?”

“For now. You should rest some more, the damage was extensive.”

Jo feels a cold lump form in her stomach. “My eyes?”

“The medical facility in Raphael’s Halo has prosthetics.”

Raising shaking hands she presses her fingers to her face feeling for the edge of the bandages that itched her cheeks. She didn’t go under it but instead skims her fingers over the surface of the cloth. The pressure hurt but it was nothing compared to the light headed dizziness that swept through her as she felt it give where her eyes should be. It gives and gives until the fabric was pulled taut......She’s sucking in air in short panicked bursts, sick with the feeling that if she could cry she would but she lacks the necessary means.

Jo feels the bed dip under the weight as the Synth settles in next to her and pulls her hands away from her face. Lucifer doesn’t try to soothe her or promise things beyond his scope. He simply stops her from clawing at her wounds and forces her to lean against his still solid form. When the shaking stops he lets her hands go. “Rest. I will keep watch.”

She can’t stop herself from grasping and clinging to his clothes as he tries to move away, being left alone in the dark is just too much. She‘s half afraid it would be the straw that breaks the camel‘s back and send her over the deep end. “Don’t…don’t leave me? Please.”

“You did not leave us. I could do no less.” For the first time she hears something in his voice aside from the pleasant bland tone and she wonders as she falls asleep why the admiration of a machine warms her so much.


	2. Into the Pit

The Pit is the sort of place a person would chew their own arm off to avoid being sent to. Dean walked himself right in. To be fair there was a lot of background that affected that decision but in the end that didn’t change the fact that he’d managed to walk into a place where others feared to tread with a smile on his face.

The smile didn’t last long.

It was no where to be found when he was being shoved into the open bowl of one of the out of service smelters. He did his best to ease the impact with the rough iron by rolling as soon as he hit, the action saved him from some broken bones but he could feel the contact shave off skin along his arms. Dean does his best to act more wounded than he is by making it a slow laborious thing to get to his feet. “Dean,Dean, Dean. I’m beginning to think you’re not appreciating the care and effort I’ve been putting into your training. Not everyone who comes to the Pit gets the benefit of my expertise.” Dean doesn’t bother to look up as Alastair’s voice echoes down. He already knows the sort of smug expression the man would be wearing and seeing it first hand does nothing to sate the deep-seated desire Dean has to wipe it off. 

With a pickaxe.

He takes the time to dust off his knees as the guards on the rim above him laugh and jeer. Unlike any other refinery station The Pit didn’t have actual employees, all resident were contract bound into indentured servitude any rank or position was won by playing a part in the massive internal politics. To shorten years of study down into a few seconds the “guards” were handpicked from the sick assholes who fell into step behind Alastair. He spared the men in question a one fingered salute as he tried to refocus and catch up with the current villainous monologue.

“…… having heard about our little games, our entertainment here, a friend on the outside snuck me in something new on the supply ship. It’s a choice treat from corporate headquarters….”

_Blah, blah._ The low grinding of the spout doors creeping open helped drown the inane chatter out.

This wasn’t new to Dean, Alastair loved to hear himself talk and since he couldn't seem to keep his own mouth shut he often found himself in the belly of one of the smelters fighting against whoever he’d pissed off lately or whatever strange creature crawled aboard the transport ships. The worst so far had been that horde of hungry rats from the lunar base.

“….Give me your professional opinion, Dean. As the son of a prominent Xenobiologist and quite the traveler yourself; have you ever seen the like?”

Dean was already focused on the dark opening at the base of the bowl with him, but even with his eyes adjusted to the dim light of The Pit he missed the first few hints of movement. It wasn’t until the long black fingers curled over the metal lip and that graceful curve of black rose up that he had any idea what he was dealing with.

Had he ever seen the like?

Yeah, and it wasn’t like he’d ever forget.

_Mom is screaming and the station lights are still stuck on emergency orange when Dad bursts out of the nursery with the blanket wrapped bundle in his arms. Dean barely has time to wrap his skinny arms around Sammy before Dad is shoving him into the closet for the medical supplies, locking him and the baby in behind an inch and a half of Durasteel and shatterproof glass, before heading back toward the nursery._

__

__

There is a splash of red against the wall and he can see his mother’s hand slam against the security panel. 

_He never sees what happens next after his mother locked herself in with that thing but he will always remember the sound of its piercing shrieks as the containment protocol for the station kicks in and the locked room is purged with fire……._

His already bleeding back is pressed tight against the rough metal walls as the crowd falls silent in their regard of the newest addition to the games. The lone creature moves slowly, as if it has no interest in the human trapped in the bowl with it, and pries itself free of the spout.

Not alone.

Never alone.

Dean flashes a quick glance up toward the dark rafters high above the smelters and the men surrounding them. There is no tell tale movement but that’s not proof enough. He wretches his gaze back down as the creature lifts its head as if scenting the air. Lips curl back from silver tinted fangs and Dean knows that his brief stint of invisibility has passed.

He also knows he’s damn well not going to stay in the little death trap with it.

There’s barely a sound before it lunges at him and the act sets the jackals lining the rim cackling and jeering once more. He scrabbles like mad at the last second to throw himself out of the way of the claws and teeth. He dives to the right and lets the curve of the floor speed his roll to give him the momentum to get back on his feet and running.

He forgets, mid-motion, about the tail but the creature is quick to remind him as it lashes out and digs a burning furrow along his side. He can hear the blood as it hits the metal walls but he’s too focused on the way his feet stumble and catch as his knees give way.

Warm, wet, penny flavor fills his mouth and runs down his lips.

He doesn’t have to look to know its curled behind him and poised to strike. Rolling his eyes up he gets a good look at the startled faces of the men above him. They never thought Dean would fall in a fight so quickly. Alastair apparently hadn’t thought his new toy was quite that impressive but from the look on his face its obvious that he’s pleased. “Don’t worry, Dean. You can still pay off your debt, your contract is very clear on that.”

Dean smiles the same cocky grin he did the day he walked in and shifts his gaze ever so slightly to the right and the wall behind his tormentor. The creature’s teeth tear into his back and leaves him with no air to scream but his grin doesn’t waver, only grows tighter at the edges, because he knows something the rest of the poor bastards didn’t.

The problem with monsters is that there is never just the one.

Dean doesn’t have to scream; Alastair does a fantastic job for both of them.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sharp bursts of light and sound cut in between the soothing bouts of nothing.

__

Fire.

Screams.

Static.

Then there is the harsh drag as fingers pry his eyelid open and flash a penlight across his pupil.

“- AKA Dean Winchester. Contract 56-78-H property of Edlund Industries. DOA.”

“Toss him in the vat with the rest.”

“Christ. Look at this record….”

“You get some sick fucks in here, Novak. Just dump the body and keep the tab running.”

“I understand, Sir, its just….he’s a decorated hero. I don’t get what he was doing here.”

“Hero you say? Take that over to the Doc. He’s always looking for-”

The words turn muffled and the light fades away.

**Author's Note:**

> I will expand an episode or return to a particular character if there is interest.


End file.
